Chapter 60
WILLIE NORRIS’S OFFICEwas located in what had once been a residence in a neighborhood about a mile from Drews’s bakery.
The young woman in the front room immediately rose to greet them when they walked in. She was polite, if a bit shy, though Decker could sense something guarded, almost anxious in her features. She worefaded boots, jeans, and a white cuffed shirt. The computer on her metal desk was at least ten years old. Paper files were scattered over the desk’s surface.
They had passed two cars in the driveway, a shiny black new Lexus convertible and a rusted-out ancient Ford pickup truck. Decker thought he knew which vehicle belonged to Norris and which one to his secretary.
A momentlater Willie Norris walked into the room. He was short and portly with slicked-back graying hair. His chin was pointed, his nose as narrow and spiny as a mountain ridge, and his eyes were two bits of coal in fleshy sockets. He wore an ill-fitting three-piece gray suit. A cigarette dangled from one hand.
“Come on back, come on back,” said Norris, waving a flabby hand.
He shutthe door behind them.
Decker looked around the room, which clearly had once been a bedroom. Where the closet had been was a built-in shelf filled with plastic binders. The man’s desk was an antique partner’s desk with elaborate moldings. A grimy square of rug was set under the furniture. On the wall were a series of framed certificates indicating membership in a variety of insuranceorganizations.
Norris sat down behind his desk and motioned to them to take seats opposite him. He took one final drag on his smoke and then ground it out in an overstuffed ashtray.
He smiled ruefully. “I wouldn’t even insure myself,” he said. “Obese, smoker, bad lungs, worse kidneys.”
“Never too late to start a new chapter,” said Jamison pleasantly.
“Thinkit’s a little late for me. But you folks looking for insurance?”
“For my sister, yes. She just lost her husband.”
“Overdose?” said Norris, a little too quickly.
“No, why would you think that?” asked Jamison.
“You must not be from around here. You’re young, so I assume your sister is too. And her husband. Young man dies around here, it’s either a DUI thatwent way bad, or it’s an overdose.”
“He died in an industrial accident.”
“Oh, okay.”
“Can you give me some information about the process of getting insurance?”
“Sure can.”
He pulled open a drawer, riffled through it, and handed Jamison a folder with some loose pages inside. “That will help her start the application process, but I can answer anyquestions you might have or she can set up an appointment to meet with me.”
Decker said, “I assume she’ll need to take a medical exam and go through some sort of background check, in addition to filling out the application?”
“Depends on how much coverage she wants. You got companies giving out small policies with no medical exam and no real due diligence. They’re just countingon the actuarial tables, but I don’t like to do business that way. Especially here.”
“Because of all the overdoses?” said Decker.
“That’s right. Young man, old man, don’t matter. One wrong pill, you’re dead.”
“How much life insurance can somebody buy?” asked Decker.
“Depends on the individual and what the underwriter will approve. If you want a policy fora ton of money that is out of whack for your personal situation, then that’s going to be a problem. Also depends on what you do for a living. If your job is working in a daycare that’s one thing. If you’re a police officer or a fireman that’ll be a factor. An underwriter may not write that policy, or the premiums would be higher. Or the policy might even exclude from coverage your dying from somethingrelated to your profession. So if you’re a cop and get shot in the line of duty, it won’t pay out.”
“My sister is thirty-three and in excellent health, and she’s a homemaker with a young daughter.” She glanced at the overflowing ashtray. “And she doesn’t smoke.”
“Okay, I can’t commit to anything based on that, of course, but how much insurance is she looking at?”
“A million, maybe more? I mean, how much is normal?”